Description of Fonticula

Fonticulid slime mould, amoeba with aggregating cellular and encysting stage resembling slime molds. Sorocarp volcaniform. Amoebae with filose pseudopodia and discoid cristae - a combination of characteristics which makes assignment to either acrasids or dictyostelids uncertain. The proposition of Fonticula being a bridge between these two categories of slime molds is inconsistent with distant relatedness of these two types of protist and was excluded from the Heterolobosea by Page and Blanton (1985). Type locality: dog dung, Kansas.